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I have just purchased a very old bronze vase but need help dating and ID'ing it. I'm sure it's Chinese but would welcome any information. It's 12" tall and about 8" wide at it's waste. The base mark seems to be six characters. Would love to know more about it.
Kind Regards
Tom

Your vase is a modern 20th c. copy in the style of an archaic bronze vase from the western zhou era (about 3000 years ago). The mark looks like a strangely rendered Yongzheng mark of the 18th c., but I don't know of any genuine bronzes with this mark.

The criss cross markings on the bottom resemble those created during cast molding of ancient bronzes, but your vase is either loss-wax or sand casted as is evident in your first photo that shows drops of bronze along the criss cross lines...this would never happen in the original molding process.

Hi Tim,
Thank you for your super detail in your reply.
I don't suppose you can tell me how to read to vase mark.
Or is it just a made white wash.
Kind Regards
Tom

It's difficult for me to say whether this is Japanese or Chinese. The mark reads down in three Characters as 政治作, meaning "Made by/for the Government" (transcribed in Chinese Mandarin as "Zhengzhi Zuo" or in Japanese as "Seiji Tsukuru"). Japanese foundries were making a lot of castings like this circa 1900 to accommodate the fabrication of electric lamps. Many of them were adorned with colored enamels. Bronze vessels made during this period in China and Japan often were fabricated of separately cast pieces, such as handles that were attached by screws and fairly thin, easily drilled bases that were soldered into place.

Best regards,

Bill H

My guess is that Bill H. is on the right track and that this is a Japanese version of an archaic Chinese vessel but not meant as made by "the government", rather the same characters pronounced differently as either Shoji or Shochi as the artist's name. 政治 tends to mean "politics" rather than "the government" I think.

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